The rift between the United Nations and Bosnia-Herzegovina's leaders widened Friday when the Muslim-led government said it will no longer deal with top U.N. envoy Yasushi Akashi. The shift came after the government asked the U.N. Security Council to review the peacekeepers' mission in Bosnia. "We don't talk to Yasushi Akashi anymore," Hasan Muratovic, the minister in charge of U.N. relations, told a Norwegian newspaper. "For us, he does not exist anymore."

The rift between the United Nations and Bosnia-Herzegovina's leaders widened Friday when the Muslim-led government said it will no longer deal with top U.N. envoy Yasushi Akashi. The shift came after the government asked the U.N. Security Council to review the peacekeepers' mission in Bosnia. "We don't talk to Yasushi Akashi anymore," Hasan Muratovic, the minister in charge of U.N. relations, told a Norwegian newspaper. "For us, he does not exist anymore."

U.N. peacekeepers said they could not protect Sarajevo from Bosnian Serb shelling after their commanders forbade punitive NATO air strikes. U.N. spokesman Alexander Ivanko said U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi and Gen. Bernard Janvier, the chief U.N. commander, ruled out NATO intervention in retaliation for a Serb attack that killed 11 people in Sarajevo on Sunday. "They (Bosnian Serbs) got away with murder," Ivanko added. With the U.N.

After Bosnian Serbs seized U.N. peacekeepers last month, U.S. Ambassador Peter W. Galbraith accused the U.N. chief in the Balkans of failing to safeguard the troops, according to U.N. sources. Galbraith, ambassador to Croatia, insisted to U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi that it was folly to leave peacekeepers in posts where they could be easily taken as hostages by Bosnian Serbs.

The Bosnian government Thursday refused to renew a four-month truce that expires at the end of this month and accused the international community of indifference toward Bosnia's suffering. U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi met for two hours with Bosnian Prime Minister Haris Silajdzic but failed to persuade him or his Serbian foes to extend the cease-fire beyond April 30 to give diplomats more time to find a negotiated settlement.

Bosnian leaders demanded Thursday that the top U.N. official in the former Yugoslav federation resign, accusing him of helping Bosnian Serbs redeploy tanks around Sarajevo. The uproar threatened efforts by international envoys to restart peace talks and undermined the United Nations' credibility in Bosnia. The dispute involved at least five Serbian tanks that arrived late Wednesday and on Thursday at the protected zone around Sarajevo. Even though heavy weapons are forbidden in the area, U.N.

Although the destruction of a Bosnian Serb antitank gun by U.S. A-10 attack aircraft Friday was of little real military consequence, the United States and its allies hope to get a big diplomatic bang from the NATO air strike near Sarajevo. The antitank gun, ancient and outmoded, was hardly very threatening. Bosnian Serb military strength in the war with the Muslim-led Bosnian government remains untouched.

Escalating a battle over U.N. actions in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the United States issued an unusual public slap at U.N. envoy Yasushi Akashi on Friday, saying he was too lenient when he let Bosnian Serbs move tanks through the weapons-exclusion zone around Sarajevo. State Department spokeswoman Christine Shelly said the United States strongly objected to the violation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization-enforced zone and said: "We would like to see (Akashi) do a better job."

The diminutive, bespectacled bureaucrat who heads the U.N. Protection Force does not look like a man who could cause the world's most powerful alliances to crumble. But the credibility of the United Nations, as well as that of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, may well ride on judgments by Yasushi Akashi, the career U.N. functionary who has already twice capitulated to Serb belligerence on behalf of the rest of the world.

After Bosnian Serbs seized U.N. peacekeepers last month, U.S. Ambassador Peter W. Galbraith accused the U.N. chief in the Balkans of failing to safeguard the troops, according to U.N. sources. Galbraith, ambassador to Croatia, insisted to U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi that it was folly to leave peacekeepers in posts where they could be easily taken as hostages by Bosnian Serbs.

U.N. peacekeepers said they could not protect Sarajevo from Bosnian Serb shelling after their commanders forbade punitive NATO air strikes. U.N. spokesman Alexander Ivanko said U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi and Gen. Bernard Janvier, the chief U.N. commander, ruled out NATO intervention in retaliation for a Serb attack that killed 11 people in Sarajevo on Sunday. "They (Bosnian Serbs) got away with murder," Ivanko added. With the U.N.

The Bosnian government Thursday refused to renew a four-month truce that expires at the end of this month and accused the international community of indifference toward Bosnia's suffering. U.N. special envoy Yasushi Akashi met for two hours with Bosnian Prime Minister Haris Silajdzic but failed to persuade him or his Serbian foes to extend the cease-fire beyond April 30 to give diplomats more time to find a negotiated settlement.

Although the destruction of a Bosnian Serb antitank gun by U.S. A-10 attack aircraft Friday was of little real military consequence, the United States and its allies hope to get a big diplomatic bang from the NATO air strike near Sarajevo. The antitank gun, ancient and outmoded, was hardly very threatening. Bosnian Serb military strength in the war with the Muslim-led Bosnian government remains untouched.

Escalating a battle over U.N. actions in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the United States issued an unusual public slap at U.N. envoy Yasushi Akashi on Friday, saying he was too lenient when he let Bosnian Serbs move tanks through the weapons-exclusion zone around Sarajevo. State Department spokeswoman Christine Shelly said the United States strongly objected to the violation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization-enforced zone and said: "We would like to see (Akashi) do a better job."

Bosnian leaders demanded Thursday that the top U.N. official in the former Yugoslav federation resign, accusing him of helping Bosnian Serbs redeploy tanks around Sarajevo. The uproar threatened efforts by international envoys to restart peace talks and undermined the United Nations' credibility in Bosnia. The dispute involved at least five Serbian tanks that arrived late Wednesday and on Thursday at the protected zone around Sarajevo. Even though heavy weapons are forbidden in the area, U.N.

The diminutive, bespectacled bureaucrat who heads the U.N. Protection Force does not look like a man who could cause the world's most powerful alliances to crumble. But the credibility of the United Nations, as well as that of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, may well ride on judgments by Yasushi Akashi, the career U.N. functionary who has already twice capitulated to Serb belligerence on behalf of the rest of the world.

A Japanese government mission departs for Cambodia Wednesday to begin preparations for the country's first-ever dispatch of noncombat troops to a U.N. peacekeeping effort. Although a law passed by Parliament in June permits Japan to dispatch a peacekeeping mission of up to 2,000 members, including both military and civilians, Yasushi Akashi, the U.N.

U.N. envoy Yasushi Akashi said he still plans to get Bosnia's warring factions together for cease-fire talks. His assurances came hours after his spokesman in Geneva said all such plans had been scrapped. "In this job, life is full of unforeseen developments," Akashi told reporters as he announced a later meeting with Bosnian Vice President Ejup Ganic. Akashi said Bosnian Serb leaders had agreed to move their forces from a ridge just inside the exclusion zone around Gorazde and let U.N.